Questions.....RE: The Greenhouse Effect

[IanC]

Your comment on a rogue planet is a non sequitur because we are dealing with energy flowing through a system.

SSDD's IGL "argument" is a denialist hoax, in effect stating that a gas upon compression will heat up, and then, in that compressed state, keep that temperature indefinitely. It's not worth anybody's time.

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Sorry, I dealt with the second part of your comment and forgot to return to this.


"Denialist hoax" ? "not worth anyone's time" ?

I don't mean to sound harsh but are you crazy? Air under compression by gravity is the framework of the atmosphere. The biggest factor.

The atmosphere swells in daylight by storing more energy, shrinks at night by releasing energy.

How is that not worth talking about?

An admittedly poor analogy is pumping up a leaky balloon. If you put as much air in as is leaking out the balloon will stay the same size. If you slightly increase the input the balloon will grow until the extra pressure equalizes the input output. And vice versa. Or you could change the size or number of leaks keeping the air input steady to the same effect. The air input corresponds to solar, the leaks corresponds inversely to GHGs.

You can't have an Earthlike atmosphere without an input of energy, the IGL will give you the temperature if rearranged to use density rather than a proscribed volume. And it would be sensitive to changes in composition such as adding GHGs.

 

[polarbear]

I know that you are focusing on the concept, but I also know from what you posted in the past that you disagree with the numbers the IPCC cranked out so far.
For example the serious discrepancies in the proxy series you exposed a couple of years ago.
It turned out that the concept using tree ring proxies is not any better than using what the groundhog did on groundhog day as a climate proxy.
Overall I do not disagree with the concept as you lay it out, but somewhere along the line that has to be expressed in numbers.
If we use empirical data then we have to rely on the tree ring proxy and M.Mann speaking as the master of ceremony for the Yamal tree instead of the groundhog.
So the best way would be as you suggested as a step#1 to start out with a sphere that has no atmosphere and hash it out what kind of numbers we get with the numbers we picked for the factors that determine the outcome for step #1.
There is no way to avoid picking some numbers like for example the albedo.
There is also no way to short circuit the thermal property and the mass that has to be warmed during a 12/24 hour exposure cycle using the StB equation....and proceed by using an average value between the maximum and the minimum for that cycle.
I`m looking forward to see what you and others who wish to discuss the step by step concept you suggested have to say regarding step#1.
One thing is for sure the way the U of Washington "solved" step #1 is ridiculous.

Yes, the whole dim flat disc assumption is bogus. Especially when you consider that most of the things that make Earth habitable happen around the daily maximum.

I still haven't figured out a good way to get people here to realize a watt of highly ordered, short wavelength solar input is much more capable of doing work than a watt of diffuse IR. The two are not interchangeable but they are assumed to be.

Wow...! Your reply got buried under a pile of verbal fist-fighting in this thread.
I am sorry I`m taking so long to respond while you wind up having to fight multiple battles during that time. It`s not even possible for SSDD to discuss your concept with us in the order you suggested because he gets dog-piled with arguments that do not even come to play yet at step#1 & a sphere with no atmosphere. The 2 points you mentioned here are a good example of how some of the most basic physics have become stumbling blocks instead of building blocks.
"Yes, the whole dim flat disc assumption is bogus. Especially when you consider that most of the things that make Earth habitable happen around the daily maximum."
Which is exactly where I also would have continued at step#1.
For convenience`s sake I decided to use a typical RC charge/discharge curve to illustrate this:

The temperature curve approaching the daily maximum would look quite similar to a capacitor being charged with a limited output power supply. The power supply being the incident solar radiation being distributed over 1/2 the sphere while the capacitance simulates the mass of the spherical shell that is being warmed during the (12 hour) "charging" cycle.
Assuming a situation where we begin with the very first charging cycle it would be unreasonable to think that we already arrived the temperature plateau we will reach after that cycle has been repeated many times over. I say that because during each cycle the mass being warmed will increase by the amount of heat that penetrates to a slightly greater depth of that shell.
We can observe this with the temperature/depth gradient on land and in a body of water.
That will affect what happens next when the warmed portion of the shell rotates into the discharge portion of each cycle. As the number of cycles progresses the charge (or heat) which is retained to the end of the discharge cycle and the beginning of the next charge cycle will not be the same as it was at the start when we "booted" this system...but will have increased by a small amount.
However eventually we will reach a plateau for both, the charge and the discharge cycle.
I`m looking forwards to see what your thoughts are regarding this up to this point are.

Sorry, but your example does not resonate with me.

For any point on Earth the solar power input is a sine curve followed by zero input, then repeats.

The output from the surface is relative to T^4, that is why it warms up faster in the morning and cools down faster in the evening and at a slower and more even pace as the night wears down.

The atmosphere fluffs up during the daytime as it stores energy from the Sun and surface, only to shrink again during nighttime as it loses that extra bolus of energy, roughly half to the surface.

That`s okay with me, but consider that the wave form portions of that RC curve matches a sine wave that has the top chopped off. And that is only because that particular RC circuit is paused for an arbitrary time between the end of the charging phase and the beginning of the discharge.
If you don`t pause it then you get the sine wave oscillations you are looking for.
So far so good keep going on with your concept. Anything is better than this rather crude averaging concept and these attempts to make a straight line function out of an empirical scatter plot would you not say so also?

Hey polarbear, why don't you jump into the discussion on whether solar input is equivalent to a body at -18C. I would be interested to see how you interpret it. My explanations don't seem to be convincing anyone on the other side.

Sure, if you wish. But what makes you think they would believe it when I say it?
It always comes down to this silly average everything, no matter what it is concept.
I already talked about this -18 C idea early on in this thread, but the whole thing got side tracked into spats that had little to do with the subject.
Just go to that U of brainWash web page and take a look at it.
ATM S 211 - Notes
They get the -18 C by averaging the radiation over the 2 hemispheres, the illuminated side + the dark side, then reduced the radiation further with an albedo and dimming it even more with clouds that they say can exist around a mass-less body which has no gravity and atmosphere.
I say this is a pile of garbage and the only thing that is true, is that the 4th root of the garbage pile divided by the StB constant converted to deg C is -18.

 

[Wuwei]

Let me add a thought to that.

Whatever IR radiation is being absorbed by GHG, would travel, or so that "dialog" would suggest, through the rest of the atmosphere "upward" by conduction, probably tens of kilometers, in a medium of very low conductivity. Think a kilometers-thick insulation layer. The consequences would be huge. Heat would essentially be trapped at the lower ranges of the atmosphere, as there's no reason why an "excited" GHG molecule should transfer its energy by collision exclusively "upward", when downward an O2 or N2 molecule is hit first. Moreover, for the heat to escape to space in the end, according to this model, the atmosphere needs to be heated up right to the top. However, what we actually see is the stratosphere cooling. A cooler stratosphere is not consistent with a warming earth and exclusively conductive heat transfer. It is, however, consistent with more radiation absorbed and trapped at lower levels due to higher GHG concentrations, and consequently less energy transfered to higher levels to heat up the stratosphere.

So, I'd say that so-called "dialog" is yet another denialist fraud, not worth the electrons used for posting it. Small wonder it doesn't come with a link.

I agree conduction would be very small. The last sentence in SSDD's post 545 wrongly says that convection is more important than IR radiation. Convection, of course, is easy to measure. There would be continuous large updrafts. He has no empirical support for that conclusion.

 

[polarbear]

Let me add a thought to that.

Whatever IR radiation is being absorbed by GHG, would travel, or so that "dialog" would suggest, through the rest of the atmosphere "upward" by conduction, probably tens of kilometers, in a medium of very low conductivity. Think a kilometers-thick insulation layer. The consequences would be huge. Heat would essentially be trapped at the lower ranges of the atmosphere, as there's no reason why an "excited" GHG molecule should transfer its energy by collision exclusively "upward", when downward an O2 or N2 molecule is hit first. Moreover, for the heat to escape to space in the end, according to this model, the atmosphere needs to be heated up right to the top. However, what we actually see is the stratosphere cooling. A cooler stratosphere is not consistent with a warming earth and exclusively conductive heat transfer. It is, however, consistent with more radiation absorbed and trapped at lower levels due to higher GHG concentrations, and consequently less energy transfered to higher levels to heat up the stratosphere.

So, I'd say that so-called "dialog" is yet another denialist fraud, not worth the electrons used for posting it. Small wonder it doesn't come with a link.

I agree conduction would be very small. The last sentence in SSDD's post 545 wrongly says that convection is more important than IR radiation. Convection, of course, is easy to measure. There would be continuous large updrafts. He has no empirical support for that conclusion.

He has no empirical support for that conclusion because according to you there are no continuous large updrafts like these:

So you say then that all this talk about more frequent & more severe storms was fake news
But lets just go see if these "large updrafts" are continuous:
LMGTFY
Lightning strikes reach the ground on Earth as much as 8 million times per day or 100 times per second, according to the National Severe Storms Laboratory
I would say that qualifies as continuous.

 

[Olde Europe]

I agree conduction would be very small. The last sentence in SSDD's post 545 wrongly says that convection is more important than IR radiation. Convection, of course, is easy to measure. There would be continuous large updrafts. He has no empirical support for that conclusion.

Oops, I actually missed that last "convection". Thanks for the correction. So, we're treated to a theory that requires continuous updrafts, right through the Tropopause and all the way up to the top of the atmosphere, where radiation to space is supposed to happen. That whole thing is even more ridiculous than I thought.

You can't have an Earthlike atmosphere without an input of energy, the IGL will give you the temperature if rearranged to use density rather than a proscribed volume.

The IGL tells you what temperature a gas will have if you compress it from one to 92 bar. It doesn't tell you anything about the temperature of that compressed gas an hour later, or a year later, or 10,000 years later. That requires, I thought we agreed on that, some calculations concerning energy input in the form of solar radiation, as compared to energy radiated out to space.

 

[SSDD]

So in the end, your argument is that it is merely coincidence that the ideal gas law accurately predicts the temperature of every planet in the solar system with a moon.....is it also coincidence that the greenhouse can't even predict the temperature here without an ad hoc fudge factor?

 

[Crick]

As has been pointed out to you on numerous occasions in the past, the ideal gas law applies to closed systems - systems that have no energy or mass entering or leaving. The Earth receives energy from the sun and radiates it away to space. The same is true of every other planet in this solar system and beyond. The heat that developed as our atmosphere grew radiated away billions of years ago.

You seem to believe that compression continues to produce heat forever and ever. That is absolute nonsense - as are so many of your contentions.

 

[Wuwei]

So in the end, your argument is that it is merely coincidence that the ideal gas law accurately predicts the temperature of every planet in the solar system with a moon...

Tell me how the ideal gas law predicts the temperature at the earth surface at the equator and how the math differs from a prediction in the arctic circle.

 

[Wuwei]

Lightning strikes reach the ground on Earth as much as 8 million times per day or 100 times per second, according to the National Severe Storms Laboratory
I would say that qualifies as continuous.

That is happening continuously from the deserts to the arctic circle?

 

[SSDD]

So in the end, your argument is that it is merely coincidence that the ideal gas law accurately predicts the temperature of every planet in the solar system with a moon...

Tell me how the ideal gas law predicts the temperature at the earth surface at the equator and how the math differs from a prediction in the arctic circle.

Tell me how the greenhouse hypothesis predicts the temperature at the surface..at the equator...on any planet in the solar system with an atmosphere?

 

[SSDD]

As has been pointed out to you on numerous occasions in the past, the ideal gas law applies to closed systems - systems that have no energy or mass entering or leaving. The Earth receives energy from the sun and radiates it away to space. The same is true of every other planet in this solar system and beyond. The heat that developed as our atmosphere grew radiated away billions of years ago.

You seem to believe that compression continues to produce heat forever and ever. That is absolute nonsense - as are so many of your contentions.

It has been proven...in the laboratory...repeatedly that there are temperature gradients in still columns of air...in a constantly moving air mass such as the atmosphere, of course the pressure will continue to produce heat, till such time as the atmosphere is all the same temperature which will never happen...funny you can't differentiate between a gas bottle and the atmosphere...

 

[SSDD]

Lightning strikes reach the ground on Earth as much as 8 million times per day or 100 times per second, according to the National Severe Storms Laboratory
I would say that qualifies as continuous.

That is happening continuously from the deserts to the arctic circle?

Not necessary...tell me, where do you suppose the atmosphere remains still for any appreciable amount of time? Denial of reality won't make the greenhouse effect real...it is flawed from its foundations...

 

[Wuwei]

Tell me how the greenhouse hypothesis predicts the temperature at the surface..at the equator...on any planet in the solar system with an atmosphere?

You are dodging the question. I have not studied GHG predictions.
Tell me how the ideal gas law predicts the temperature at the earth surface at the equator and how the math differs from a prediction in the arctic circle.

 

[Wuwei]

Not necessary...tell me, where do you suppose the atmosphere remains still for any appreciable amount of time? Denial of reality won't make the greenhouse effect real...it is flawed from its foundations...

The atmosphere isn't still. But do you agree with polarbear. that there are huge towering clouds from updrafts happening continuously from the deserts to the arctic circle?

 

[Olde Europe]

Here goes:

File:Map of projected global warming across the globe by the 2050s. Projections based on three SRES greenhouse gas emissions scenarios. Data from CMIP3 (2007).jpg

The following description is based on the cited public-domain source (Gardiner et al, 2012): These maps show the average of a set of climate model experiments projecting changes in surface temperature for the period 2050-2059, relative to the period from 1971-1999. There are three different maps. Each map shows projected temperatures for a different scenario of future greenhouse gas emissions. The top left map corresponds with IPCC emissions scenario A1B; the top right map IPCC emissions scenario A2; and the bottom left map IPCC emissions scenario B1. These emissions scenarios are described in the following paragraphs. All models project some warming for all regions, with land areas warming more than oceans.

"The net impacts of [...] human actions and choices on future greenhouse gas concentrations are fed into models as different “scenarios.” For example, [IPCC Scenario B1] assumes that humans worldwide will make more sustainable development choices by using a greater range of, and more efficient, technologies for producing energy. In this scenario, carbon emissions are projected to increase from today’s rate of about 9 billion metric tons per year to about 12 billion tons per year in 2040, and then gradually decline again to 1990 levels—5 billion tons per year—by 2100.

[IPCC Scenario A2] assumes humans will continue to accelerate the rate at which we emit carbon dioxide. This is consistent with a global economy that continues to rely mainly on coal, oil, and natural gas to meet energy demands. In this scenario, our carbon emission increases steadily from today’s rate of about 9 billion tons per year to about 28 billion tons per year in 2100. [IPCC Scenario A1b] assumes humans will roughly balance their use of fossil fuels with other, non-carbon emitting sources of energy.

Because temperature projections depend on the choices people make in the future, climate scientists can’t say which one of the scenarios is more likely to come to pass by the end of the century. These scenarios are estimates, and greenhouse gas concentrations may grow at rates that are higher or lower than the scenarios shown in the graph. If future carbon dioxide emissions follow the same trajectory as they have over the last decade, increasing at a rate of more than 3 percent per year, carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere would exceed [the IPCC A2 scenario] by the end of this century, if not before."​

That's how climate science struggles to project warming anomalies (compared to the period from 1971-1999), and comes up with quite a range of different warming regionally and due to different emission scenarios, where as the IGL pressure theory has us believing one bar of pressure leads to the exact same temperature around the globe.

Ludicrous.

 

[Olde Europe]

It has been proven...in the laboratory...repeatedly that there are temperature gradients in still columns of air...in a constantly moving air mass such as the atmosphere, of course the pressure will continue to produce heat [...]

Pressure does not produce heat. Ever. Compression - change of pressure - does.

Of course, in downward drafts air will be compressed, and warm up. The other side of the coin is, for every cubic meter of air flowing downward, a cubic meter has to flow upward, and cool down because of decompression. That sums up to, in effect, no temperature change.

Your scientific illiteracy, after four years of posting about climate science, is patently amazing. Small wonder then that a concept like the adiabatic lapse rate, the difference between the dry and wet rate, and the huge difference between that and the (environmental) lapse rate remains incomprehensible. Even less of a wonder is that you'd fall for that IGL-pressure nonsense.

 

[polarbear]

Not necessary...tell me, where do you suppose the atmosphere remains still for any appreciable amount of time? Denial of reality won't make the greenhouse effect real...it is flawed from its foundations...

The atmosphere isn't still. But do you agree with polarbear. that there are huge towering clouds from updrafts happening continuously from the deserts to the arctic circle?

They happen continuously in the intertropical convergence zone.

But according to you this massive convection process has no influence whatsoever on the rest of the global climate. After the 97% of the "climate science consensus" who thought otherwise endorsed your idiotic fluid-dynamic non-event version they will be so impressed with your genius that they might name a street or some landmark after you

 

[IanC]

You guys are arguing with SSDD (and me to a certain extent) because you think everything he says is wrong.

He is saying you can derive the temperature at a certain pressure of an existing atmosphere by examining it. I concur with the minor improvement of using density as a universal quality rather than the local quality of volume, because my method picks up GHG composition as well.

I think you guys who disagree should put forth your own explanation of how an atmosphere stays in place. You cannot have mass suspended in the gravity field without stored energy, and that stored energy is proportional to the temperature.

 

[Olde Europe]

He is saying you can derive the temperature at a certain pressure of an existing atmosphere by examining it. I concur with the minor improvement of using density as a universal quality rather than the local quality of volume, because my method picks up GHG composition as well.

As far as I have seen, SSDD is wrong on everything, he isn't thinking, and neither debating. All he does is grab whatever he can from Wattsupwiththat or hockeyschtick or whatever denialist blog he reads, and endlessly repeat it here. Whenever he is asked a question, he can't or won't answer.

You have, on earth, atmosphere of pretty much the same pressure / density at sea level, and at temperatures ranging from -70°C to +50°C. According to SSDD, that's inexplicable.

 

[polarbear]

Lightning strikes reach the ground on Earth as much as 8 million times per day or 100 times per second, according to the National Severe Storms Laboratory
I would say that qualifies as continuous.

That is happening continuously from the deserts to the arctic circle?

Not necessary...tell me, where do you suppose the atmosphere remains still for any appreciable amount of time? Denial of reality won't make the greenhouse effect real...it is flawed from its foundations...

Yesterday I spotted a bunch of posts where the same idiots that keep defending that idiotic U of brainWashington greenhouse gas radiation diagram were using an easy bake oven as an example to prove the concept of back-radiation.
I don`t even want to bother looking for it but it was hilarious because for some strange reason the whole lot brandished it with glee that you can cook batter in it by powering it with a 100 watt light bulb. Yet none of them would have even the slightest idea why that is so, because there is no way to use the StB equation in order to be able to explain how that oven would get to over 250 deg F past room temperature.
I looked up the dimensions for one of these that use 100 watt incandescent light bulbs at Amazon.com. It has a surface area of 4.75 ft^2.
If you do the StB math in metric then the 100 watts get spread out over 0.442 m^2 and the oven would radiate out as much power as it gets from the 100 watt bulb at -22 C .
But just like in the U of W radiation energy balance that`s no problem.All you have to do is add enough GHG back radiation till you can bake a cookie.
No wonder none of these idiots can get a real life engineering job.
Most of the R-value tables for insulating walls are in btu per hour and for an oven like that 4 is a good enough number. It will then dissipate the same number of watts or btu per hour as it gets heated by the light bulb....100 watts=341.3 btu/hr when it is 287 F warmer than it was before it`s been turned on.
delta T [F] = 341.3 x 4[R] / 4.75[ft^2] = 287 [deg F] warmer than ambient...
F--k these idiots are too stupid to figure out which equation they should apply to what and would not even qualify to work for a toy company.